Eurozone welcomes Croatia’s bid to join euro at the earliest in 2023

Croatia has submitted a formal bid to join the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM-2), an early stage on the path to membership of the euro currency, the head of the Eurogroup of eurozone finance ministers said on Monday.

The move
could allow the Balkan country to join the euro currency zone, which currently
comprises 19 states, at the earliest in 2023, an EU official said.

Commitments
offered by Croatia in a letter were welcomed by the bloc’s finance ministers at
a meeting on Monday, the chair of the meeting Mario Centeno told a news
conference.

EU economics
commissioner Pierre Moscovici said Zagreb’s move was a “vote of confidence in
the euro.”

Croatia has
committed to preparing the ground for the European Central Bank to take over
banking supervision in the country. It has also committed to applying reforms
on anti-money laundering rules and to making the public administration more
effective and less costly, an EU statement said.

The ECB and
the European Commission will monitor the application of these commitments in a
process that is expected to last one year.